How much bonding time you get with your baby is determined by how many co-workers you have. Is that fair?

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Cat Crist with her husband Victor Tapia and their 6-month-old son Jameson in Anaheim on Tuesday, August 8, 2017. Crist was able to take 14 weeks of partly-paid pregnancy and parental leave from her employer. Because she works for a large restaurant chain, her job was protected and she can take another six weeks if she chooses. (Photo by Paul Rodriguez, Orange County Register/SCNG)

When Cat Crist gave birth, she got 14 weeks off to recover from a caesarian delivery and nurse her new son. Her job was held for her return, and, if she chooses, she is entitled to another six weeks of unpaid leave during his first year.

“I wasn’t physically or mentally ready to return to work after eight weeks,” recalled the 36-year-old restaurant manager. “I work for a big company so they had my position covered. After 14 weeks, I was ready.”

Gaby Berreth wasn’t so lucky. After delivering her son, also by caesarian section, Berreth, 26, was financially able to take just eight weeks of disability leave from her job at a small medical lab, and no extra bonding time.

“I couldn’t enjoy him fully because I was recovering from the big cut on my belly,” she said. “When I went back to work, it just got too hard to breast feed. Even cats are supposed to stay longer with their litters.”

Federal and state law divides babies into two categories. The privileged newborns have parents who work at companies with 50 or more employees, including Crist who manages a Marie Callender outlet in Westminster. But nearly half of California’s mothers and fathers have jobs at smaller businesses–there were just 22 employees where Berreth worked–and their infants often get far less parental bonding.

Next month, the California Assembly will vote on a Senate-passed bill to reduce the disparity. If approved by lawmakers and signed by the governor, the legislation would extend the same rights enjoyed by workers at larger companies–longer parental leaves and job protection with continued health coverage–to employees at firms with 20 to 49 workers.

“Family lives have changed dramatically in recent decades but our policies have remained frozen in a Leave-it-to-Beaver 1950s world which no longer exists,” said Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara), author of the bill.

“Approximately 71 percent women with children are in the workforce. But if you are a mother or father working for an employer of 49 or less, you can literally be fired for taking even a single day off to bond with a newborn.”

Growing support for parental leave

California’s push to enact more family-friendly workplace policies comes as similar initiatives are gaining support across the country.

The U.S. is the only developed nation with no mandated paid parental leave. It wasn’t until 1993 that federal law granted workers up to 12 weeks of job-protected unpaid bonding leave—but only at companies with 50 or more employees.

In 2004, California was the first state to offer any paid parental leave—but only workers at big companies were guaranteed to get their jobs back. Five states and the District of Columbia have followed suit, with Rhode Island and New York offering job protection to employees of small as well as large businesses.

California employers don’t pay for pregnancy leave—up to four weeks before a delivery and six weeks afterwards for a regular delivery, or 8 weeks for a C-section. And they don’t pay for additional parent bonding leave. Workers fund both programs themselves, with paycheck deductions to the state’s disability insurance program.

Jackson’s bill, SB 63, would not change that financial arrangement.

Still, the fate of the legislation is uncertain: a similar measure was vetoed last year by Gov. Jerry Brown after a lobbying push by businesses. It is unclear how Brown will react this year.

Once again, the California Chamber of Commerce—a politically powerful force in Sacramento—has labeled the bill a “job-killer.” Groups such as the Orange County Business Council and Irvine- based Western Growers along with chambers of commerce in Long Beach, Torrance, the San Fernando Valley, Riverside, Irvine, Santa Ana and Fullerton signed a letter to lawmakers saying it would “overwhelm small employers.”

Critics include Sen. Jeff Stone (R-Temecula), who owns a 20-employee Murrieta pharmacy that he says would suffer if several trained technicians took parental leave at the same time. “Businesses are in a pot of boiling water like a lobster, with more taxes and regulations,” he said. “This is saddling yet another mandate on small businesses that are struggling to survive.”

Have and have-not babies

In California, 41 percent of job-holders work for an employer with 50 or more employees— or four percent of state businesses.

Those are the fortunate ones who get 12 weeks of job-protected baby bonding time.

Jackson’s bill would expand those benefits to another 16 percent of the workforce and an additional 6 percent of employers.

As a result, about 2.7 million Californians, including families with newly adopted and fostered children, would gain the right to job protection for 12 weeks of baby bonding leave.

The arbitrary separation of babies into haves and have-nots when it comes to parental bonding wouldn’t be fully remedied by Jackson’s bill, partly because it represents a political compromise.

It would expand job guarantees at some workplaces, but 90 percent of employers—those with fewer than 20 workers—would remain exempt from the requirements.

“Our country’s history has been to prioritize businesses over families.” Jackson said. “My colleagues are concerned about the hardships to smaller companies.”

Berreth’s husband, James, a shipping clerk for a small company, was allowed just three days off, including two days of sick leave, to care for his newborn and his wife, Gaby, after her C-section.

“Most businesses don’t want to lose a dime,” said the Anaheim resident. “They should realize that when employees are happier, they work harder.”

Brain science of bonding

George Halvorson, chair of the California Children and Families Commission and former CEO of Kaiser Permanente said the business community fails to “understand the scientific context. Too many think parental leave is vacation time for parents.

“But the first weeks of life are when children’s brains develop emotional and intellectual wiring. They need their parents at that time. The biggest ‘job killer’ is that people won’t be qualified for jobs because they’re not getting the support in their early years.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics, which along with the California Medical Association backs SB 63, warns against placing infants in daycare before the age of 12 weeks “as newborns experience rapid developmental changes during this period and are at greater risk of developing severe, difficult-to-detect illness.”

From the viewpoint of small companies, however, the Jackson bill imposes “a one-size-fits-all mandated leave program that threatens their ability to stay in business,” according to the California Chamber’s chief lobbyist, Jennifer Barrera.

“The employer must either pay other employees overtime to cover the duties of the individual on leave or hire a temp, if possible, at a premium price to cover during the absence.”

Nonetheless, the impact of the bill may be limited. That’s because even when offered job-protected leaves, many low-paid workers are unable to absorb a pay cut. The state disability program reimburses at a rate of 55 percent of wages, which will rise to 70 percent next year for the lowest-paid workers.

Charlene Castillo, a waitress at a City of Commerce diner, lost $3000 in income by taking eight weeks of pregnancy disability when her twins were born in December. She and her husband, a delivery truck driver who took just two days off, also have older children, ages 8 and 10.

The twins, one of whom was born with a neck injury, spent time in an intensive care unit. Once home, Castillo said, “I had two babies to bond with and there never seemed enough hours in the day between the feeding, burping, changing and going back to sleep and then moving on to the next baby.”

Even if SB 63 were law, requiring her diner, with its 20 employees, to guarantee her job after 12 additional weeks of leave, “I couldn’t afford to take more time off,” she said.

Big companies step up

Meanwhile, as awareness of infant nurturing science grows, many big companies have begun offering longer 100-percent-paid leaves as a way to recruit and retain top talent. Among them: Accenture, Adobe Systems, Chobani, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, Twitter and Zillow.

In April, Costa Mesa-based Experian, the 6000-employee credit agency, began offering 14 weeks of fully paid leave for mothers and six weeks for fathers.

Some companies have expanded leave only for higher paid workers. Netflix offers its 2000 white-collar workers—but not its DVD distribution center labor force–up to a full year after a baby’s birth.

Yum! Brands’ policy, announced in February, offers 18 fully-paid weeks to birth mothers, and six weeks to fathers for 2000 corporate employees in Irvine, Louisville and Plano, Texas. Tens of thousands of low-paid workers at the company’s KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell restaurants are excluded.

Influenced by progressive tech companies, San Francisco last year became the nation’s only jurisdiction to address both the affordability and the job security issue for parents of all incomes.

The city passed a measure, backed by the Bay Area Council, a local business group, to require six weeks of fully-paid job protected bonding leave for both mothers and fathers at employers of 20 or more workers.

Companies must pay the portion of their salaries that the state disability fund does not cover.

The fact that just 13 percent of private sector workers nationwide has access to any paid bonding time, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, is spurring calls for federal legislation.

Democrats in Congress are pushing a “Family and Medical Insurance Leave Act” to allow all workers 60 days of sick leave which could also be used to care for a new baby or an ill family member. Workers could get two-thirds pay up to a maximum of $1000 a week through federal unemployment insurance.

Some Republicans are advocating for a “Strong Families Act” to give employers offering paid family or medical leave a 25% tax credit for wages paid to workers taking up to 12 weeks off.

And Ivanka Trump has made parental leave her signature issue. The Trump administration’s 2018 budget includes a mandate that states offer six weeks of paid leave for mothers and fathers, funded through the federal-state unemployment insurance system.

Although some conservatives, including at the American Enterprise Institute, have called for a national parental leave program, it is unclear if Trump’s plan can pass a GOP-dominated Congress.

Unless a federal mandate gains traction, states such as California are likely to be leading the fight for more paid, job-protected benefits.

Margot Roosevelt covers economic news. She has been a staff reporter at The Orange County Register since 2012. Before that, she was on staff at the Los Angeles Times, covering environmental news. Earlier jobs: Congressional reporter for the Washington Post; foreign and national correspondent for Time Magazine.